What Is OFAC?

The Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) is a financial intelligence agency of the U.S. Department of Treasury that develops and enforces trade sanctions to support homeland security and foreign affairs initiatives.

It is integral that all businesses receiving federal funding or making payments include a provision in their compliance policies to ensure they are not doing business with restricted individuals or entities placed on the OFAC list.

Depending on industry, federal laws may require companies screen each vendor, contractor, and employee’s debarment status against certain exclusion databases.

General Services Administration (GSA)

This independent U.S. government agency identifies those parties excluded from receiving federal contracts, certain subcontracts, and particular types of federal financial and non-financial assistance and benefits. They maintain the Excluded Parties List System (EPLS), which keeps its user community aware of administrative and statutory exclusions across the entire government, and of individuals barred from entering the United States.

Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC)'s Specially Designated Nationals List (SDN)
The Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) is part of the U.S. Department of the Treasury, and responsible for administering and enforcing economic and trade sanctions against specific nations, entities and individuals. OFAC maintains these restricted counterparties in a document called the "Specially Designated Nationals List" (SDN).

Bureau of Industry & Security (BIS) Denied Persons List (DPL)
The Department of Commerce's Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) maintains two lists for Contract Officer consideration, the "Denied Persons List" and the "Entity List." For transactions that may involve exports from the United States or re-exports of U.S.-origin items, parties (including U.S. government officials) are encouraged to review the Export Administration Regulations (15 C.F.R. 730 et. seq.) maintained by BIS.

Office of Inspector General’s (OIG) List of Excluded Individuals/Entities (LEIE)
The Office of the Inspector General (OIG) maintains the List of Excluded Individuals/Entities (LEIE), a database which provides information to the public, health care providers, patients, and others relating to parties excluded from participation in Medicare, Medicaid, and all federal healthcare programs. An OIG exclusion has national scope, and is important to many institutional health care providers, because the Congress of the United States established a Civil Monetary Penalty for institutions that knowingly hire excluded parties.

To learn more about OFAC debarment screening with bcs, schedule a demo, today.